Out of my mind
by Staz
Summary: Speaking your mind is important, or so Mac learns. HM shipper story.


He stood staring straight ahead

Disclaimer: Anything JAG is not mine.

A/N: Just a short one that kinda came and asked to be written, following a rather boring Metro ride... all mistakes are mine (and I apologize if there are more than usual or if this sounds unplausible... my head is slightly sun-burnt).

Colie, I've dedicated one line to you (consider it another early birthday present), can ya guess which? ;-)

--

**Out of my mind**

He stood staring straight ahead. Spine stiff, chin up, shoulders squared, every bit of him the tall Navy man that he was. His uniform; white and crisp, probably just out of the cleaners, stood at attention with him.

I stood next to him, almost as rigidly, and tried to stop myself from stealing glances in his direction. Get a grip, Marine! Oh, but I can't... it's been a while since I've stood next to him for a period of time longer than 5 seconds. I can feel the heat emanating from him, I can just gather some vestiges of the smell of him wafting my way, I can sense the energy that can only be described as his, and it's all I can do not to throw myself at him.

I haven't got long. He's only standing here because he has to and at any given moment he might release his hands from their firm grasp, take a deep breath and walk away. I've got to do... say... something!

'So… do you come here often...?'

Oh god. Good come-on line, MacKenzie! Way to break the ice. On the other hand, Harm hasn't moved a single muscle in the last 5 minutes.

'I hate it that we're not speaking.'

His breathing is even. Measured breaths in, followed by slow exhaled breaths. He is a million miles away, standing not more than 2 steps away. I wonder if he's gone into some trance-like state.

'What do you say to a night of pizza and an action movie? Come on, it'll be great, just like old times!'

His profile remains unchanged. Still as an ivory statue, and just as graceful and breathtaking.

'I can't take this tension between us anymore, Harm! Why can't we have a normal conversation without speaking in codes and for once just say what we mean? I know we both need work in the confronting emotion department, but do you really believe that it's better this way?'

For a moment his face twitched and my breath caught painfully in my chest. But it was just an unidentified buzzing object that rudely intruded and was justly swatted away by strong hands that then immediately returned to their official position.

Harm kept on focusing on a point in the middle distance, paying no heed to the turmoil spinning round my insides.

'Okay, fine, you know what, you win...' Deep breath. 'Harm, I love you.' I open my eyes, shocked at my own open and straightforward admission. I find it essentially easier to go on. 'I have for quite some time, actually... I don't expect you to fall to your knees and proclaim the same...' I pause to check if he accidently fell to his knees. No. Okay. 'But all the same, I think you should know and at least now I know that I've made my honest feelings known. My cards are face up on the table. Your move, counselor.'

I allow myself another stolen glance at my favorite sculpture in Navy uniform. He takes a deep breath. His shoulders relax slightly; dropping just the tiniest bit. His hands come to rest on his hips as he takes another breath. I turn my face fully to him, indulging in full out staring for a while, and I'm sure my heart skipped a beat when his clear blue gaze landed on me.

And then it skipped a couple more as Harm took his blue gaze, strong shoulders, firm hands, emanating heat, tingling scent, radiant energy and deliberate breathing and walked away from me without looking back.

My shoulders slumped for a second before they were harshly reminded that this is a military setting, I am a proud officer and I will not let anything, anything cause me to slump in public. So there.

Oh god. Well, it could've been much much worse. Imagine how I'd feel if that was his reaction if I had actually said any of that out loud. Yes, so far I've managed to say more than a couple of words to him only in my head. Wonderful progress; I'm very proud of myself.

The crowd disperses and I do the same. All the pieces of my heart that had worked together in harmony at forming words and sentences in my mind, have realized that the show is over, that there's only so much dawdling one can get away with, and have meandered off to distant places inside my body to wait for a time when they're needed to work together once again. Here's hoping it'll be sometime this century.

I allow myself some dawdling of my own and my eyes follow his departing figure as it gets farther and farther away from me. Next time I'm not gonna blow my chance.

--

Load food onto fork, maneuver to mouth, chew, swallow. Repeat as needed. Not that hard, is it? Except it is when Harm's sitting just a couple of chairs away from me. It didn't use to be so problematic, but now there's this little annoying voice at the back of my head reminding me that I vowed not to blow any more chances. Well, I didn't exactly vow.. but it was just as good as.

Again, load food onto fork... I wonder if this is how dumb people eat...

But I can't exactly start a private conversation at a table with coworkers, now can I? So I'm off the hook this time. The whole eating process should be easier now.

"I'm sorry to leave while you're still eating, ma'am, but I have about a million phone calls to make and I need every minute I can get if I intend to get home and manage to make dinner." Harriet's into full apology mode, already getting up from the table.

I wave her off with an understanding smile. And then also Bud and Tiner who have their own excuses. I look up from my slow fork to find that now it's only me and Harm. He's a slow eater, choosing to chew his rabbit food carefully, as rabbits do... and me with my new eating disorder of not being able to eat in his presence... the others were tired of waiting with their empty plates.

I slide over so I'm sitting across from him. He glances up to me, then turns his attention back to the green bits on his plate.

'How's the lettuce?'

Yup, I'm really good at this. Good thing it's only in my head. The air I breathed would consider me ungrateful if I exhaled these gems on it.

'Harm, I love you.'

Even better. Actually, come to think of it, this is really what I should work on; every time I see him I should try to tell him I love him, maybe then I'll be able to actually come out with it at some point for real. Now there's a plan. I hide the grin that wants to break out on my face behind the loaded fork, even though Harm is certainly not looking.

--

I walk into JAG and almost straight into Harm.

"Oh. Sorry, Harm."

He looks startled but he regains composure quickly. Too quickly to my liking, but what can I do.

"Good morning." He almost smiles and I can't help but feel a sparkle of hope.

"Good morning Harm." I answer with a modest smile of my own. 'Oh, and I love you.' I walk away with a definite air of accomplishment.

--

"Harm, you are unbelievable!" 'but I love you still.'

"Bud's been looking for you." 'and I think he knows I love you.'

"Here's that file you asked me for." 'I love you, I love you, I love you.'

It's been like that all week and even though it's only in my mind, very unreciprocated and downright stupid, I go to sleep every night with a smile, I once again look forward to going to work and at the very least my working relationship with Harm is much much better.

But now I'm late. Late, late, late! The universe had conspired against me this morning and nothing would go right. There was no hot water, I ran out of coffee, I found a stain on my uniform top, traffic sucked like hell and there was a purple bastard that forgot to hit his brakes and proceeded to drive his car into the back of mine.

So I'm practically running through the bullpen, pausing to throw cover and briefcase and grab a file off my desk, before heading to the staff meeting.

I've managed to not miss too much, and not piss my commanding officer off, which is always a good way to start the day. The meeting was short and to the point – my favorite kind, but I'm still scribbling away, catching up with my lateness, when I notice the room is really really quiet. And tense. I raise my head.

"Tough morning?" Harm is standing next to me, leaning on the desk, smirk firmly in place.

I sigh dramatically. "Oh, you know, one of the worst... but I love you, so it's okay."

My scribbling pen screeches to a halt, catching on before I do, then drops to a vertical position on the legal pad as my hand flies up to cover my mouth. My eyes are as wide open as they can get as I stare into the confused expression of one Harmon Rabb Jr.

That was not supposed to be out loud!

He's not saying anything and I can almost make myself believe that I really did not say that I loved him to his face. But I'm not that easy to fool apparently. So I do the next best thing and try to make a run for it.

"I'm sorry." I mumble as I try to shoot past him.

Showing (more like showing off) quick instincts, Harm strikes out an arm and catches me around the waist, stopping me in my tracks. I try not to move, or even breathe... I certainly can't look at him. I would like nothing more than for the ground to open up right under me and take me away from this god awful moment in my life.

I can feel him take a not so measured breath and release it before he opens his mouth to speak. "Against undeniably staggering odds... I'm going to ask – could you repeat that?"

My head snaps around in a movement that's gonna equal a lovely pain tomorrow morning. Is he kidding me? There's a slight grin spreading his lips. It's gaining meaning and intensity by the second, and despite the nervousness, I feel my own lips move to form some sort of smile.

His arm pulls me closer and closer to him till there's absolutely nothing between us. His eyes focus on my lips and I close my eyes in anticipation.

'Kiss me, Harm.'

But his lips just almost skim the skin of my cheek for an endless second and then I feel his breath on my ear. I think maybe he might be moving his lips. It's very extremely hard to concentrate when he's this close and pressed against me and my breathing is the farthest thing from normal and my heart is galloping in my chest.

"What did you say?" I pant in the general direction of his ear.

"Oh... I didn't say that out loud...?" I swear, he's lucky I'm a bit off kilter this morning or he would've found out just how many crumbs had landed on the carpet since it was last vacuumed. I satisfy myself with a pinch to the part of his body that my right hand was nearest to, which happened to be his chest.

"Ouch! Okay! No sense of humor..." he smoothes his hands down my back, and manages to recapture the moment. "I love you too."

"Just like that?" I can't get over the simplicity in which my life had just been turned inside out.

"I think so." He nods and then presses his lips to mine in a chaste peck, probably mindful of the setting. But I'm still a bit off kilter. At least that's what I'm gonna blame it on, as I keep my hands firmly at the back of his head and pull him into a much longer, deeper, far more satisfying kiss for an end to this cold war of ours.

The door opens suddenly and we break apart and try to pick up our military façade up off the floor where it was lying with the crumbs. Our commanding officer stood there, eyes squinted at us.

"What's going on?" He shot straight to the heart.

Harm was first to flounder ""Well, sir, the Colonel ha-"

"I love him." I said point of fact before I knew what was happening.

Two sets of eyes shifted to stare at me. One in complete and utter shock for the second time in the past half hour, and another in quiet contemplation.

With a sigh and a mumble of "May god have mercy on my soul" the older man backed out of the room.

"Well, that went well..." I comment dryly. I should try not to make a habit out of this saying, or rather blurting, exactly what's on my mind all the time.

"So, how about a night of pizza and an action movie?" Out of his shocked state, Harm has read my mind, and I grin an affirmative answer. For a short yet terrifying moment I entertain the notion that I actually have been saying out loud all that I've thought lately, while everyone simply ignored me. I look up into the smiling face of the man I love and let him lead me out of the room and into the promise of a new era.

Nah.

--

The End.


End file.
